1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to stick feeding apparatus, and more particularly, to a stick feeding apparatus for delivering a plurality of sticks simultaneously to predetermined positions in a confectionary mold at a controlled rate.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the manufacture of stick-mounted confectionary food products, such as lollipops, large numbers of sticks must be delivered rapidly to product-holding molds.
Because manual insertion of sticks requires far too much time and labor, both of which lead to increased product costs, stick feeding apparatus have been developed in an effort to automate the delivery of such sticks. Examples of such apparatus are disclosed in my prior U.S. patent application Ser. No. 913,532 filed June 8, 1978 now U.S. Pat. No. 4,209,112, entitled STICK FEEDING APPARATUS and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 823,621 filed Aug. 11, 1977, entitled STICK HANDLING AND INSERTING METHOD AND APPARATUS, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,130,936 issued Dec. 26, 1978, and the patents cited and discussed therein.
One problem with known stick feeding apparatus is that such apparatus cannot be relied upon to consistently deliver sticks simultaneously to each mold in a large array of product-holding molds. Of course, if a stick is not delivered to a mold when it is supposed to be, the use of that mold is lost for at least one production cycle and product materials may be wasted. Moreover, the entire manufacturing process may be slowed since a defective product may have to be manually extracted from the mold while acceptable products may be automatically extracted. Further, should one of the dispensing elements in the stick feeding apparatus jam or become inoperative because of a clogged stick, this has usually caused the entire appparatus to be shutdown, thereby losing valuable production time as well as causing waste of product materials delivered to the mold during the production cycle.
As indicated above, it is important that a plurality of sticks be delivered simultaneously to the product-holding molds. At the very least, should a portion of the stick delivery apparatus be rendered ineffective or inoperative due to clogging or jamming at a stick dispensing opening, the remaining sticks during any one production cycle should be delivered.
Another problem encountered with prior art apparatus is that if the apparatus is adjusted to assure that a stick is delivered to each desired position, there is a chance that more than one stick will be delivered to a position during each cycle. This is not only wasteful of sticks, but may also lead to an interruption in the manufacturing process as the unneeded stick is manually removed from the mold.